


Time for Crime (Vast Error Stabdads)

by PencilSkeletons



Category: Vast Error
Genre: Alternate Universe - Homestuck Stabdads, Exonerated Executor is there too but never said by name, Gen, Other characters mentioned - Freeform, but with Vast Error instead, wrote this with human versions of the characters in mind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:54:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23171272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PencilSkeletons/pseuds/PencilSkeletons
Summary: Jack gets a visit from the last person he wanted to see.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 18





	Time for Crime (Vast Error Stabdads)

**Author's Note:**

> So I wrote this a while ago, but I wanted to wait until around the second intermission to fix it up and then post.  
> I have no idea if I wrote the characters right or not, so fingers crossed.
> 
> (This story does contain a brief mention of suicide.)

“Up and at em, Noir. You’ve got a visitor waiting to see ya. Ain’t it your lucky day.”

The fake motherly voice of the prison guard fills Jack’s ears. It’s the kind of voice she only uses to let him know that today will be just as bad as every other day since he first got here. Though unlike the other times, he had been awake for a while, so she wasn’t the first thing he had to experience this day. Jack didn’t want to get up, but he had to or else she would force him to his feet.

He stands up as slow as he can go and turns to face the guard. Whatever little things Jack can do to annoy her without getting punched brings him slight satisfaction. They always bring the same guard to him, yet he can never remember her name. Something with an E, maybe? Doesn’t matter. The last thing Jack wanted to do was get buddy-buddy with someone who enjoys his misery, and learning her first name was the first step towards it.

As they walk down past the rows of cells, Jack wonders for the umpteenth time what his crew would do if they were in his shoes. Needed something to distract him for what was about to come. Delfactor would most likely befriend E, and E would treat him like a misbehaving child. Though along the way he could probably find something incriminating about her and use it as blackmail. Dealer would hate it here, but wouldn’t show it. He would also hate E, but not as much as Jack does. E would treat him like any other prisoner. Maybe the two would exchange in some small talk. As for Bones, Jack wasn’t sure how he’d handle it here. He tended to have zero patience, which was required in abundance at this prison. She would probably treat him normally as well. None of them would be treated like how he was. Something about how she “sees something different in him” or whatever the hell that meant.

Jack’s mind reminded him that he forgot someone, to which he thinks back he knows and doesn’t want to think about them right now. Unfortunately, luck wasn’t on his side. The two reach the Visiting Room and Jack immediately sees him from the other side of the glass. Murrit Turkin, his adopted kid and the traitor who ratted the Dead Shufflers out. The reason their leader is behind bars and the other three are on the run. The only reason Murrit wasn’t arrested as well was because he made an anonymous report, police couldn’t trace him back to Jack as he wasn’t officially adopted (So actually, no! He wasn’t his kid!), and probably some other backhanded ways Jack couldn’t prove but knew he did.

E plops down Jack in the seat, reminds him he only has an hour to talk, then walks off to stand by where they just entered from. Jack grumbles, wishing he was anywhere but here. He stares daggers at Murrit, who just smiles at him. The nerve of him to be here with his shit eating grin and stupid shutter shades, the two paired up with the ugliest hawaiian shirt ever. Though Jack couldn’t see them from his side, he was most definitely wearing crocs. It only made sense, as it would be the perfect cherry on top of the most over decorated sundae. Christ, was he going through an early mid-life crisis or a late rebellious phase?

Murrit was the first to start the conversation. “Wazzup, old man? Long time no see. Did ya do something with your hair?” Yep, Jack hated this. Not even a minute in and he wanted out. He tried not to show how repulsed he was, but he was sure he accidentally let out a grunt.

“Ah, you be silent. That the kind of game you playing? Fine, I can continue spewing out words. Not much of a conversation, but I can work with this. Tell ya what,” He puts a fist on the glass. “We may not touch, but we can pretend. So give me some good ol’ bumping action. If it helps, you can pretend it’s my face.” Jack continues to glare, not even bothering to look at Murrit’s hand. Murrit backs off, possibly slightly dejected. Hard to tell with the mouth is the only readable part of his face.

“No, I get it. I get it. It’d be silly to hit the glass. You’d probably throw a real punch at me. All that’d mean is you’d be staying a bit longer. So...” Murrit looks down at his hands. “Normally this is where I’d ask what you’ve been up to. But I realized that there isn’t really much to do in prison. And I sure as hell ain’t telling you what I’m doing now. Don’t need you hunting me down when you break out.” Murrit laughs pathetically, then looks back up at the former con man. He loses the grin.

“So if you’re still going to give me the silent treatment, lemme just cut to why I’m here. I actually want to talk to you. And I mean talk, not apologize.” He pauses to adjust his shades. “Figured you’d think that’s what I came to do. Honesty, I don’t regret what I did. Didn’t mean for you to end up here though. That was never part of the plan. Well, not exactly. It was more of a thing that happened due to natural circumstances, even if the thought did cross my mind. Regardless, yes I did rat you out. No, it’s not because I don’t care about you anymore. You will always be my favorite not technically adopted guardian. It’s just, you know...”

“I’m nineteen now, and up until two years ago I’ve been in the crime biz. There’s a point in every young teen’s life when they ask themselves what they want to do. I thought I knew, but then I realized I don’t like what I’m doing. It’s a spit at everything you taught me, I know. But at some point I was just bored with all this. I didn't want to be forever known as Murrit Noir-Turkin, child of the leader of a crime ring. I’ve gotten my own life just by sneaking out a couple nights, and I wanted to live it.” Murrit pauses. “But there was always something in the way of that goal. And if a convoluted plan was going to do that, then I wouldn’t want to miss my chance.” Wow, never in his life has Jack heard such utter crap. Soon, Murrit went back to his “new Murrit” self just as quick as he left it. “So who reverse carded me? It was Bones, wasn’t it? The Brute! No wait, was it Delfactor?”

Finally, Jack responds. “Are you still talking?”

“Oh hey! The sharp man speaks at last!” Murrit leans back in his chair, his smile returning. “Turns out he didn’t lose his voice within three months of incarceration. Don’t bounce out yet, because there’s more where that came from!”

“If you don’t cut it out, then I’m going now,” Jack snarls.

“You’re no fun, you know that?”

“Well pardon me if your presence alone is enough to put me in a shit mood.”

Murrit laughs. “Damn, if prison changes you this much then I wonder what would happen to me.” That’s it. Time to strike. Jack slams his fit down hard.

“Like you haven’t changed at all, you fucking traitor!” Murrit’s smile is gone again. Good, Jack thinks, this’ll hopefully wipe it off for good. “If you didn’t want to be part of the Dead Shufflers anymore, I would’ve happily cut ties with you if I knew what you’d do to me!” Jack feels the need to punch rising, but he stops it by putting his other hand over his punching hand.

“Well Jack, our definitions of cutting off ties are very different,” Murrit states. “Yours on a more literal matter. Cutting ties means you’ll kill them, breaking bridges means you’ll drown them or push them off a bridge, ‘I will make your life a living hell’ is lighting a guy on fire, dousing the flames, then lighting them on fire again. If you wanted to cut off ties with me, you should’ve done it nineteen years ago.”

Jack pauses to gather his thoughts. He figured now would be a good time to tell him the truth, not that it would matter in the end. Just important that Murrit has this info now while they’re here. He feels his fingernails digging into his hand as it remains closed up. “Do you know why I took you in, Murrit?” he asks.

“No,” Murrit answers. “Of all the times to get that story.”

“Well don’t go crying over it and just listen. Around seventeen years ago, we were hunting down a guy who owed us something. What it was, I don’t remember and I don’t care to. When we located his home, we just decided to take something of his until he paid us back. It was a mistake to let Delfactor choose, and it was an even bigger mistake not to check what he put in the trunk before we left, because now we’ve got a sleeping kid on our hands.”

Murrit’s shades slip off his face as he stands up and slams his hands down. Jack can hear the chair fall. “I was a ransom?!” Murrit shouts.

“Sit back down!” Jack shouts back, and Murrit does so. After picking his chair back up, of course. He doesn’t even bother to readjust his shades, letting his eyes show. “Not at first. We gave your old man six months. He killed himself a week later. Would rather be dead than save his old child. Saddest excuse of a human being I’ve ever seen.” Jack lets the info sink in with Murrit for a bit before continuing. “I tried looking for the mother, but she was dead too. Didn’t know how, and again, didn’t care. We had to lay low for a while since we figured the news would be up in arms about a missing kid, but no. Not even a single milk carton. As if the world never knew Murrit Turkin even existed before now.

“We had no idea what to do with you. None of us were comfortable killing a child, so I had the dumbass idea of raising you. No one was able to talk me out of it, and Delfactor only made it worse by encouraging it. I don’t know what it was, but I saw something in you that reminded me of myself. The plan was to just keep you for a few years and then put you up for adoption when we felt things were safe.” Jack looks down at his hand. It’s no longer closed, but it’s starting to hurt like hell. He’s pretty sure it’s bleeding from the marks his nails left.

“But you ended up staying. Like a leech, you somehow wormed your way into our little group.” Jack kicks his leg at the unintentional pun. “And I let you stay. I gave you a new home, taught you the ins and outs of what we do, and for once I expected nothing in return but respect. You were my child, Murrit. Something I never thought I would have. Since feelings are already spilling out, there was a point in time where I wanted to stop the ‘crime biz’ and just raise you!” If Jack was anyone else, he would be crying by now. But he never cried in his entire life. And even if he did, Murrit didn’t deserve any pity tears.

“It was utter bull, but one night I had some kind of epiphany. I could be an everyday single father raising his kid. I could’ve actually adopted you. You could’ve gone to a public school and I could’ve found a dame to call my wife. I would’ve done that for you, Murrit.” Jack pauses again and looks back up at Murrit. “But I realized how stupid that was, so I’m glad I had at least some semblance of logic.”

Murrit pipes back in once he’s sure he’s done talking. “So what’s the point of telling me all that? To make me feel bad? To say that you and I both fucked up? That everything you did didn’t matter in the end!”

“I’d like to think of it more as a big thank you and fuck you for wasting my time.” Jack answers. “ Now let me end it off with this. I don’t care about hunting you down. I just never want to see you ever again. And if you try to talk to me ever again,” He points a finger against the glass. “I promise that I will fucking kill you.” Murrit doesn’t respond. He only slips on his shades and leans back.

“But for now, I bid you adieu.” Jack stands up and turns away. “Guard, I’m ready to go now.” He almost forgot she was here. E informs him that he’s only been here for 20 minutes. “I don’t care. Just take me back. I’ve already wasted almost two decades worth of minutes.” With that, E escorts Jack back to his cell. The last he sees of Murrit before he’s out of view is him just staring at him. No clear expression, no clear reaction, not even a rush to get out. Just... nothing.

E tells Jack she’ll be back for him soon as she locks his cell behind him. He just responds with a grunt. He lies back down in his sorry excuse for a bed and faces the wall. If time travel was real, he sure wishes he could do it to undo everything bad that happened in his life. Being in prison, getting the worst guard, finding Murrit, Tom, continuing to raise Murrit, the list goes on. He just wants to forget today, so he tries to do so by observing the cracks in the walls for the umpteenth time while thinking where the others might be. It doesn’t work.

**Author's Note:**

> If I had finished this two days earlier, I could've posted this on Murrit's wriggling day. Oh well.
> 
> Also near the end I referenced the poem in Mantle Piece, which is where I noticed they spelled adieu wrong.  
> https://vasterror.bandcamp.com/track/mantle-piece
> 
> Edit: Realized I made a mistake with year stuff and fixed it.


End file.
